Genjuan International Haibun Contest 2019 Results

The results of the 8th Genjuan Haibun Contest are as follows.  It was a good year for Canadian writers! We received 94 entries from a record 19 countries this year. Our gratitude goes to all entrants and congratulations to the awardees. We also wish to thank our new judge, Toru Kiuchi, for his hard work and insightful remarks. The five prize-winning 2019 entries should be posted to the Icebox on a separate page in a fortnight or so (find orange link at top right). Hopefully you will enjoy them as much as the judges did.

Grand Prix

Memories of a Coal-Miner’s Grandson   Bryan D. Cook  (Canada)

An (Cottage) Prizes

Wigan Flash    Judy Kendall  (UK)
Come and See   Sean O’Connor  (Ireland)
White Out   Marcyn Del Clements  (USA)
Seeing in Darkness ..Branko Manojlovic . (Serbia/Japan)

Honourable  Mentions

House of the Sun   Jeff Doleman  (USA)
An Aura   Diana Webb  (UK)
Food for Thought    Ignatius Fay  (Canada)
The Beggar near the Palma Cathedral   Joan Prefontaine  (USA)
Cherries   Terry Ann Carter  (Canada)

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Poll: Chief Characteristics of English Haiku (Mar. 2019 update)

If you scroll down the right-hand margin of the Icebox top page, you will find a poll, in which everyone is still most welcome to participate – just once! The software has the ability to prevent second-timers or those who would try to choose more than 3 options. People from all over the world have taken part. If you click on the words ‘See Results’ at the bottom of the poll area, you will see the latest number of votes for each characteristic. Clicking there in Mar. 2019, I notice that we have now had 200 people return their idea of what might be the ‘Three Chief Characteristics of English Haiku’, so perhaps it’s time again to look at some of the poll’s emerging conclusions.

The two categories of Juxtaposition and Cut/break now total 89 votes together, which means that almost one in two people think that aspect is crucial. In Japanese haiku these are known, respectively, as 取合せ toriawase and 切れ kire and may be viewed as related features. It is true, however, that there are ‘un-cut’ haiku in both the Japanese and the English haiku-writing worlds. No, break is not an absolute requisite.

In second place, I notice that Originality and Poetic voice have thus far together polled 72 votes … and Resonance and Open-endedness garnered 71 between them. For now, allow me to put aside the first, Originality, which is a requisite of all poetry, not just haiku. I shall keep that quality of ‘expansiveness’ (Resonance) in mind, though, as we continue through the top of the league.

More or less equal in third place, we have Moment and Present tense (aggregating 64), and Brevity and Omission (aggregating 57). Ordinary present-simple and present-continuous tenses clearly rule the roost in English haiku-writing, but a ‘Present moment’ quality is not something that is considered in Japan, where verbs may come in many different tenses and might even sometimes be a touch classical in tone. Brief expression is obviously a requisite of haiku, though how brief exactly is open to debate.

As most will already know, the three chief characteristics of the classical Japanese haiku are: 1. 5-7-5 form, 2. Seasonal reference, and 3. Break (often using a cutting word). In spite of plenty of experimentation over the last 100 years, 5-7-5 kana letters as a single line is still today the normal style in Japan.  Looking again at our poll results, I find that 5-7-5 and 3-lines together polled only 31 votes from 200 people. Seasonal reference gathered in just 38 votes; the same number, interestingly, as Real experience. I propose now to add Real experience (38 votes) to Present moment (64): and we get 102, which brings it to the top of the charts!

It is thus tempting to conclude that the three most important characteristics of English haiku, at least from this poll as it stands today, are:
……… 1. The present moment (102 votes)
……… 2. Break (with or without punctuation) (89)
……… 3. An expansive quality felt at poem’s end (71).
Concision is in fourth place (57).

The English haiku poet’s craft, when thus analyzed, may appear to be quintessentially about the vividness of the Present situation and the utilization of Break as a technique through which to create Resonance for the reader learning of it. Being a Brief expression is evidently also highly valued, as it should be, although free-form haiku is clearly the current norm. For me personally, I was a little sad that Sound/cadence has thus far only polled 21 votes – one in ten: not insignificant, but definitely a minor characteristic for most. This is no doubt partly because of the almost puritanical minimalism that has reigned supreme since around 2005 in most of the leading haiku mags and sites, according musicality little importance. Icebox is in this respect rather different. Seasonality is probably in fifth place (38, and there’s nothing to couple it with): again, slightly disheartening for one who was born in Britain and now lives in Kyoto – a city with a deeply seasonal flow. The English-writing world is such a big place!

Your comments on this interim overview are welcome. Just click on the word ‘comments’ below to open up the reply box. Feel free to tweet it or to share it on Facebook. Next report? Perhaps after another 200 have responded!

Ellis

Dear friend and Hailstone member, Ellis Avery, passed away on Feb. 15 of this year. She had been fighting cancer for quite a while, and several of her friends here in Kansai knew of this. A few of us were fortunate to have had dinner with her on what we now know to have been her last trip to her beloved Kyoto, in December 2018. Some of us were given her latest Haiku Datebook containing her daily English haiku for the last full year of her regretfully shortened life. The first poem in it goes:

………. Bright sun, blue Charles,
………. her hand in mine. So thankful
………. for this day, so keen for more.

The Charles is the name of the river running through Boston, MA, where she lived with her wife, Sharon Marcus, and where my own grandmother lived in later life and died (but at more than double Ellis’ age of 46). This haiku especially brings tears to my eyes.

Some of you may remember Ellis as a contributor to Hibikiai Forum, as a judge of the Genjuan International Haibun Contest or perhaps, more likely, as a prize-winning novelist. Amongst her works outside of haiku were The Smoke Week (2003), The Teahouse Fire (2006), and The Last Nude (2012). She was not only a brilliant writer and fine poet, but also a most compassionate person: in fact she had been training to become a nurse. Our thoughts go out to Sharon. Her artistic legacy will survive!

Ellis’ latest haiku collection can be purchased here: http://www.harvard.com/book/haiku_datebook_2019/

This is the penultimate haiku in the book:

………. The leaves are dead,
………. but not the trees. They rest
………. with arms aloft. They wait.

RIP

Thinking of Angelee

For those planning to take part in next year’s Genjuan International Haibun Contest, we are very sorry to have to announce that our colleague Angelee Deodhar, one of India’s foremost haiku poets, passed away quite suddenly on June 28 in Chandigarh. She had been in recent correspondence with us, not only about the Contest and publications, but also about a planned visit to Japan next spring. Those of us who have worked with her at the Cottage of Visions are greatly saddened. She made a splendid contribution to English haibun, by editing the epic ‘Journeys’ anthology series and helping to judge the Genjuan, yet she herself always remained modest, tactful and warm. She signed off her letters, to me at least, with the phrase, ‘Love and light’ …

This graciousness will surely continue to be felt and cherished. Our thoughts are with her family and close friends at this time.

It is appropriate to share what she had apparently once referred to as her 辞世 jisei, or death verse:

water-worn boulder
so smooth now
against callused feet

RIP

New Genjuan anthology, “From the Cottage of Visions” is out!

.. From the Cottage of Visions, a compilation of the awarded works from the Genjuan International Haibun Contest 2015-17, was published at the end of May. 112pp, A5 size, 37 haibun from around the world, some written by Japanese, judges’ comments, a potted history of Japanese haibun, 4 illus. by Buson & Taiga, ￥1,300 (U.S.$13 incl. p&p).
.. This week, we will honour our commitment to all entrants of the Contest during those three years and airmail more than 100 free copies worldwide (photo shows Officer, Eiko Mori, and assistant, Teruko Yamamoto, doing the addressing!). Entry to our Contest remains free, but we have no wealthy sponsors. So, how have we managed to do this charitable act for all these years? The answer is threefold: some judges have made occasional donations, all labour is done in a spirit of volunteerism, and we have diverted some of the profits made through sales of other Hailstone publications (including Meltdown, Persimmon and our previous Genjuan anthology 2012-14) into covering some of our printing costs. We would certainly like you to buy a copy if you can! The book can be ordered through the channels outlined near the bottom of our Publications page. 

Genjuan International Haibun Contest 2018 Results

グランプリ作品　Grand Prix 
The Forbidden Pet   (Branko Manojlovic, Japan)

庵賞作品　An (Cottage) Prizes
Way of Lilies   (Marietta McGregor, Australia)
Let there be Lightning   (Ignatius Fay, Canada)
Waiting for Christmas in Ohio   (Chris Bays, U.S.A.)

入選作品　Honourable Mentions
Lost   (Sean O’Connor, Ireland)
Brazilian Night   (Marina Bellini, Italy)
Red, Blue, White   (Dru Philippou, U.S.A.)
Coal Mines   (Beth A. Skala, Canada)
Flying   (Pearl Elizabeth Dell May, U.K.)
Reflections   (David McCullough, Japan)

審査委員   Judges
Nenten Tsubo’uchi, Stephen Henry Gill, Hisashi Miyazaki, Angelee Deodhar

Sincere thanks to all authors who sent in their haiku prose works: 133 in total from 15 countries. It is wonderful to find that this year’s Grand Prix winner is a member of our Hailstone Haiku Circle in Kansai, Japan – Icebox contributor Branko Manojlovic! Hearty congratulations. For the first time, the winner will actually be able to select from the Genjuan Prize folio the large and very fine ukiyo-e reproduction print he has won. Usually, we have to imagine what the particular author might like and airmail it in a super-large protective folder. The Forbidden Pet is a very fine piece, as indeed were all the Cottage Prize winning haibun. These four works are now available to read on a dedicated page on the Icebox and you can find out what sort of forbidden pet it is! Another of our contributors, David McCullough, has won an Honourable Mention. Ignatius Fay, who won a Cottage Prize two years ago, has done it again! Congratulations to all of our awardees.

Watch this space for further announcements about the anthology of awarded pieces 2015-17, to be published next month, and the shape of next years’s Contest.

Icebox 10th Anniversary & Tohta’s Passing

Last night, Hailstone Haiku Circle held a Committee Meet in Osaka to talk about such things as sales of our latest book Persimmon, future publications, the Genjuan Haibun Contest (a record 133 entries), and a venue for one of our seminars. It was also pointed out that our Icebox site was launched on 23 February 2008, exactly ten years ago! The recent death of the much-respected poet, Tohta Kaneko on 20 Feb., aged 98, was also mentioned and some appreciative comments passed. So, both a happy and a sad time last night.

Icebox – looking back this February along the path we’ve trodden, I wonder if you’d agree that our main achievement these past ten years might have been to provide a glimpse of what it means to be a haiku poet in today’s Japan, whether you are Japanese or a resident foreigner – and not only ‘at the desk’. It has to be respectful, genuinely creative and fun. Japan is, of course, an ace place to grow rich in haiku and its spirit. ‘Risk’ and ‘wonder’ are also perhaps two keywords, describing both our haiku and our activities as a whole. We have also hopefully given you a taste of Japan’s deep seasons. I see from my WordPress dashboard that we’ve so far had 468 posts from our contributors, almost 3,000 comments (anyone can leave these), created 32 special pages (see top right, on subjects such as haiku, haibun, renga, haiga), added 50 links to other recommendable haiku or related sites (see blogroll), a search facility, archives, a publications page (where you can find out how to order one of our books – including the Kikakuza and Genjuan Haibun anthologies), a poll on what you think are the 3 most important characteristics of English haiku (click on ‘results’ to see how it is going!), an events page (for those of you who can speak at least a little English and are in W.  Japan), and a submissions facility (via the reply box/comments on the Submissions – NEW! page). Yes, you can submit to be included in the regular ‘from the Icebox inbox’ postings! There are also experimental spaces where attendees at our two main seminar groups (in Kyoto and Osaka) can get comments on work-in-progress. After ten years at this game, perhaps you’ll allow the Icebox team a quick “Banzai!” Let me also express gratitude to my fellow editors, Gerald Staggers (aka Duro Jaiye) and Hisashi Miyazaki; to David McCullough for helping to start the site;  and also, to our contributors (notably Nobuyuki Yuasa, or ‘Sosui’) who try to keep this weblog up there with the best haiku sites there are. A timely bow.

… With snow all around
… The crimson berets of cranes
… Stand out in the sun ……………………………….. (Sosui)

Tohta – as many of you will know, he was one of Japan’s  greatest modern haiku poets, a leader of the Gendai Haiku Association, an opponent of war and political revisionism, a charming and humorous man, who had several foreign followers who for long studied under him. I never had that opportunity, alas, as not in Tokyo, but I do have two treasured memories of him, in both of which I can still clearly see the twinkle in his eye and his real passion for the art of haiku. The first was after a paper I’d delivered to an international conference in 1997 attended by most of the prominent poets from the haiku organizations in Japan and America. I was the British interloper who spoke about ‘Haiku as Poetry and Sound’. When I’d finished, from his seat in the front row, he raced up to the lectern and said in a loud, jovial way, “Gambare!” (‘At a boy! Keep it up!) and proceeded to explain that ongakusei (cadence or musicality) was to him one of the three most important aspects of haiku. One of the others, by the way, was fiction, which not many foreign haiku poets believe in – certainly not for haiku! The second vivid memory of Tohta was when I went to interview him for a BBC Radio programme I was making on the recent history of haiku (both in Japan and abroad), Close to Silence.  Very soon after we got started, he got out a haiku he’d just composed that day and asked me, somewhat feverishly, what I thought about it, as if it was much more important than the interview itself – he, a venerable and well-respected leader of haiku in the Land of Haiku; I, an ex-Events Officer for the British Haiku Society! He was all ears, though.

… サングラスのパブロピカソに蜜蜂
… sangurasu no Paburo Pikaso ni mitsubachi
……… Wearing sunglasses
……… Pablo Picasso, confronted by
……… A honey bee! …………………………………………….. (Tohta)

In my imagination, Picasso must be wearing one of his trademark hooped T-shirts to somehow match the bee! I laughed loudly that day and I still laugh at this now. We will miss him greatly.